Watcher
by Inkling1
Summary: Rating might change to PG-13. Marauder story as told from an outsider's viewpoint. A Watcher, a magical historian with uncanny observations, arrives at Hogwarts to watch what happens before the war.
1. Sorting the Insignificant

A/N: My first stab at Marauder fic. They're just so cool I have to try one out! Sorry, that sounded incredibly nerdy. This is pretty much going to be the whole Marauder's life at school from another viewpoint. There will be plenty of detail, though. Anyway, please r/r.   
  
Disclaimer: This isn't my stuff. It's Rowling's. Duh. Except for Moira. Again, duh. If you haven't figured this out yet, then you probably haven't read many fan fictions.   
  
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Floating candles, enchanted ceilings, moving pictures: it was all out of some fantasy world that I had imagined as a little girl. What was I doing here? I did not belong, and by coming I had ostracized myself from everywhere that I did fit in.  
  
  
  
My name is Moira Wellington. I am what wizards, well decent wizards, call a Muggle-Born. I just turned eleven, and I just got my letter to Hogwarts. My parents thought it was some not-so-brilliant joke from one of my many not-so-friendly classmates. After all, I have lived in longing for a magical world for years. But it had to be out there; what else would explain it all?  
  
All my life those weird little accidents that happen to maturing wizards and witches kept me from being normal and participating in normal. Because of that, I have acquired a more observant personality. I am a bystander, but I make the most wonderful witness in the world. It seemed to be a place for me.  
  
And then came the letter. I ran away from home, hoping beyond hope that it was real. It was, and I was now in Hogwarts, standing in the Great hall in awe. I was happy; I guessed. But my parents would never accept me back, and the conversations about Quidditch, the Ministry of Magic, and just plain little metaphors about knarls and goblins through me for a loop. I was just as abnormal here as I had ever been.  
  
There was a hat on the stool in the center of the Hall, the Sorting Hat. I took in its appearance in a glance. Dusty and ancient. I held in my surprise as it sang a song and watched with much more interest as a middle-aged, strict-looking Professor McGonagal, read the names of the first years.  
  
  
  
I saw the shy, the afraid, the confident, the worried, and all those other emotions that students experienced in their little walk to the hat. I saw their feelings when they were sorted, always into the House that they wanted. Even if they couldn't have named it themselves, their personalities were what marked them for their House. That made me feel better. Ravenclaw, I thought, I'll be a Ravenclaw.  
  
A few students especially caught my attention. The first was a boy named Sirius Black. He sauntered to the hat. An untrained eye would have called him arrogant, but I saw differently. It was a sort of defiance, a rebellion in a walk.  
  
  
  
"Gryffindor!" the Hat proclaimed loudly.  
  
The boy rebelled his way to the appointed table, a wide, ironic grin on his face. Whatever revolution he was taking part in it was against the Slytherin table; I saw the hatred that radiated between the Lion and the Snake. For the first time, I saw surprise on their faces, on some of the staff's faces too.   
  
"A Black in Gryffindor?" a boy gasped beside me.  
  
I turned to look at the source of the exclamation and was met with two very tired eyes under pale brown hair. The boy looked sad and a little nervous. It wasn't nervousness at the Sorting; it was a sort of inherent anxiety.  
  
"Remus Lupin," he said to me, but did not offer a hand. "What with 'the house of Black' being such a pillar to pureblooded nonsense, it seems kind of a shock for their eldest son to be a *Gryffindor* of all things!"  
  
I shrugged. "We aren't our parents. I, incidentally, happen to be Moira Wellington."  
  
"Certainly agree with that sentiment," Remus smiled and my momentary suspicion that he had something against Muggle-Borns vanished.  
  
I turned back to the Sorting. A girl had just been called; I pulled out of my mind the name. (I had a certain ability to recall things that I had not registered at the time.) She was Lily Evans. She was a Muggle-Born; I saw that immediately. Her eyes were not on the other students, but on the magic of the Hall. She walked smoothly for all her amazement, though. Another Gryffindor I knew before the Hat announced the verdict.  
  
I watched as he sat down, and Lily Evans struck up a conversation with him.  
  
Then came a myriad of others who did not, for some unfathomable reason, catch my attention. It had always been that way. I was attracted to concentrating my observation on a few certain people.   
  
They called Remus soon after. His fatigue was portrayed in his shuffling walk. There was something in the way that way he held his head that begged for acceptance; I would have labeled him a Muggle-Born, but for his earlier comment. He, too, became a Gryffindor. Why was I watching them? I frowned all the way through the M's, N's, and O's. I realized it could not be the *House* that I was focusing on because a few other girls insignificantly became Gryffindors.  
  
Something snapped me out of my reverie as a mousy, sandy-haired, scared-looking boy by the name of Peter Pettigrew tried on the Hat. The words to describe him filled my head, even though I had not really been looking at him that long. He was subservient.  
  
"Gryffindor!"   
  
There it was again. I tried to force my observation on the next boy, but even as I did, I knew that I would have watched him no matter what.   
  
James Potter had the most interesting walk I had ever seen. He swaggered, almost like Sirius Black had, but this was a little closer to arrogance. However, he did not think that he was better than everyone else was; he *knew* it. He was confident to a fault, as if nothing had ever gone wrong before.  
  
"Gryffindor," I muttered under my breath to the surprise of some standing near me.  
  
The Hat verified it. No one looked surprised at that proclamation. He sat down at the table and talked animatedly to Sirius Black. They shook hands as if it was their first meeting.  
  
On and on it went. I hated having a "W" last name. Then again, the tables did not have near the view that I did.  
  
I was beginning to think that I had seen the last of the "important" ones. Then, suddenly, I found my mind taking notes of the appearance of a boy named Severus Snape.  
  
And, good morning, was there ever such an explosion of adjectives? He was angry at the world, and apparently shampoo. He sulked and pouted all the way to the Hat, was promoted to Slytherin, and sulked and pouted all the way to that table. He pulled a book out of his bag and hid himself within its depths. No one smiled at him, and no one bothered him. It was a preset, mutual agreement of isolation.  
  
Only two people were left now, a girl whose name escapes me now and myself. The girl became a Hufflepuff.  
  
"Wellington, Moira," McGonagal said, and I walked up to the Hat slowly.  
  
Suddenly, everyone was watching me. I did not like having my role in life reversed. The Hat, made for an adult, slipped over my head easily. I waited for it to announce "Ravenclaw."  
  
Instead, a voice spoke very quietly into my ear. "Oh dear God, not another one."  
  
What are you talking about? I thought, figuring it would hear.  
  
"I did not think that we would have to worry so soon, but I should have seen it, what with the clashing minds that I have seen over the last few years. Things are going to boil over soon. You are proof of that."  
  
"What *are* you talking about?" I hissed in barely more than a breath.  
  
"Look, you're Muggle-Born, so I'll have to explain quickly without you interrupting."  
  
I agreed silently.  
  
"I said without you interrupting. You have intense powers of analysis and observation. You remember more things than anyone has a right to. You are a living, breathing Penseive...it's this magic thing that collects thoughts. Normally, you'd go to Ravenclaw; that's where the attentive ones usually end up. But you are different; you are a Watcher, a historian for the present. They are very, very rare. In fact, I have only met three in the last thousand years..."  
  
Yes,yes, but what is a Watcher?  
  
"Watchers appear before times of great events. Unfortunately, the events are usually terrible. There was one Watcher at Hogwarts just before Muggles forced the wizarding community to form the International Code of Secrecy. That's the last one I remember, and that was in 1692."  
  
So something bad is going to happen, and I am going to witness and record it.  
  
"No, Moira, you are to bear witness to things that lead up to whatever is going to happen."  
  
"Well what is it?" I hissed.  
  
"I don't know, but I know this will be a burden for you. However, I see in your mind that you have already chosen those to watch. The Watcher always understands, subconsciously, what exactly to see."  
  
I thought of those six that had stood out so in the ceremony.  
  
Without warning, the Hat shouted, "GRYFFINDOR!"  
  
As I pulled it off, I heard that little voice say, "If you ever need anything, I live in the Headmaster's office."  
  
I imagined briefly walking up to the Headmaster, telling him I needed to see his office, and then speaking to a Hat for psychiatric help. Things were going to have to get *very* bad around here before I would resort to that.  
  
I sat down with the other Gryffindors, feeling more out of place than ever before.  
  
What was about to happen? And, more importantly, why was it those six that I needed to watch?  
  
I checked off their names in my head: Sirius Black the rebel, Lily Evans the awestruck, Remus Lupin the weary, Peter Pettigrew the servant, James Potter the sure, and Severus Snape the detached. What a motley crew!  
  
I did not see how they could fit in together, but if the Sorting Hat knew what he was talking about, and it seemed like a Hat that would, they were, at least, the beginnings of a puzzle.  
  
Might as well work on it now.  
  
"Hello, Lily Evans, my name is Moira Wellington," I said, reaching across the table. "How are you?"  
  
"Thunderstruck and happy," was the fervent reply.  
  
Of all her features, I could not take my eyes off those green eyes. The Watcher knows what to see. I just wished I understood it.  
  
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A/N: I know this chapter was sort of dull, but the rest will be more exciting. This was just the set-up. R/R! 


	2. The Complications of Being a Watcher

Disclaimer: In my wildest dreams, I own everything. This is not my wildest dreams. I own nothing.  
  
A few weeks went by uneventfully, although my mind involuntarily catalogued about a thousand different details with every step that I took. It got to the point where I barely saw anything but those "important" things. I ran into things and people that I hadn't even noticed were there, a new experience for me.  
  
I felt little things that I could not possibly have any reason to feel. In Potions class, which Gryffindor had with Slytherin (a pairing that indeed seemed to be age old), the sight of Severus Snape in the student's desk gave me a horrible sense of vertigo. Strange as that sounds, it was only one of many instances.   
  
Finally, it got so bad that I did take that awkward trip up to the headmaster's office to talk to the Hat. It was, as of yet, my only real friend.  
  
Professor Dumbledore greeted me with a grave smile.  
  
"Ah," he said, after a brief and silent appraisal, "you are Moira Wellington. You are our Watcher?"  
  
"Yes, sir," I said trying to out stare his disconcerting blue eyes, "but I don't really know what that means. I don't know what to watch."  
  
"You are here because you do, Miss Wellington, only you do not understand what you are seeing."  
  
"You can say that again," I scoffed. "All around me, everything seems wrong. There's a boy, James Potter, and he shouldn't have hazel eyes!"  
  
I did not even stop to think about how that might sound to someone who did not know what I was talking about, but Dumbledore seemed to at least somewhat understand.  
  
"That's not absurd, Moira, please sit down," he said, as a chair appeared spinning in the air.  
  
  
  
I sat and listened to his explanation for my increasingly confusing life.  
  
"What you are seeing are shards of the future, a future that will be affected by the events that are decided by this present. It is a sort of precognition, made all the more potent by your keen sense of observation. Here and there, things have left so strongly a mark on the world that the ripples of it extend even to the past, for those attuned enough to see. [1]"  
  
  
  
"Can you, sir?"  
  
"No, there are very few who can. You are probably the most attentive Watcher that has ever existed. That worries me."  
  
"How? Why?"  
  
"It means that whatever is coming will be that much worse-"  
  
  
  
"Or better," I interrupted.  
  
Dumbledore looked far from convinced.  
  
"Can I do anything to stop an event from happening if I see something horrible?" I asked.  
  
"It is best that you do not," Dumbledore said, not meeting my eyes, "because we cannot know how it will affect the rest of the future."  
  
"So if I see someone and think, 'He should be dead,' I can't warn him?" I said angrily. I did not like this predestination thing at all.  
  
Dumbledore looked at me very seriously. "Oh no, Miss Wellington, I am not saying that at all," he said, "I am just saying beware of what consequences your words might bring."  
  
He folded his hands in a way that said the interview was over. I left, more befuddled than ever before.  
  
****  
  
Unfortunately for me, my personal life got in the way of the Watcher in me when the owls came swooping down at breakfast the next morning. The school owl I had sent my parents, as soon as I had gotten the guts to do so, landed in front of me. with trembling hands I took the letter off its leg, and it flew off again. Would my parents accept me back?  
  
My stomach churned unpleasantly as I realized that the letter was my own, still sealed. Across the flap, my mother had written in bold, angry words.  
  
I have no daughter.  
  
I burst into noisy tears at the middle of the table. Several people ogled at me as if I was some alien, and I got hastily to my feet. Before I could stumble three steps, though, I felt a hand on my shoulder.  
  
It was Lily Evans.  
  
"What's wrong, Moira?" she asked, her face full of concern.  
  
"It's nothing," I lied, trying to return to my exodus.  
  
"People don't sob over nothing," she pointed out kindly, and walked with me out of the Great Hall.  
  
Once inside the Gryffindor Tower, she again asked what was wrong. Silently, I handed her the letter. She stared at it for a moment, and I saw comprehension dawn on her face.  
  
"Oh God, Moira, that's awful. I'm a Muggle-Born, too, and my parents thought the whole thing was a joke, but when it turned out not to be, they were so happy for me. My sister, Petunia, wasn't. I think she's jealous, truth be told. She's older than me, and she was the one who was always reading the fantasy books and pretending to see fairies and such, and it was me, the one who read Nancy Drew and *real* things that was the witch. It's something of a cruel irony, I guess, but I think she'll get over it. We were always so close."  
  
"My mother never was close to me. I was too antisocial for her. I just wanted to let the rest of the world be the rest of the world," I said, tears coming anew.  
  
"But you'll make up," Lily insisted. "She's your mother; she just needs time to get over it and accept you for what you are. Trust me. She can't really mean this. After all, you did just run away from home and pursue a dream that she didn't believe in."  
  
"That's no reason to disown me," I growled.  
  
"She didn't, just give her time to cool off," Lily said. "Look, here, I'll tell you this. Why don't you lay off on the owls for now, and go home at Christmas? Even if she is mad, she can't very well slam the door in your face. Then you can work things out."  
  
I nodded if only to make Lily happy.  
  
Suddenly a loud explosion sounded from across the Common Room, and it was echoed by hoots and cheers. The source, it seemed, was the four Gryffindor boys I had marked. James and Sirius, immediate friends, had done something or other, and Peter laughed obediently. Remus was smiling nervously. A few other older boys were staring at the two in disbelief.  
  
"How did you do that?" one of them asked.  
  
"That's fourth year magic, at the very least!"  
  
James and Sirius gave matching cocky grins. "We're just geniuses, I guess."  
  
  
  
Rising behind them, in little smoky shapes, was the gory and anatomically accurate image of a lion disemboweling a snake.   
  
Lily gave a loud "humph" and went up to her Dormitory.  
  
  
  
"Oh, come on, Evans, it's impressive!" James called after her.  
  
"Hardly," she called back.  
  
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[1] Disclaimer: This is not my idea. It is, as far as I know, first brought up by Terry Pratchett in The Color of Magic, the first novel of Discworld. (It is a hilarious series. Go read it. After you review.) I do not own it or the idea.  
  
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A/N: Leave a review, if you would be so kind! 


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